Perennial plants, pubescent-villous to glandular. Leaves basal, petiolate. Lamina (6-)12.4(-26) x (19-)21.5-23.8(-42) mm, reniform-cordate or orbicular-cordate, pubescent or glandular, crenate, crenate-dentate or toothed. Petiole 30-60 mm long, pubescent-villous to glandular. Scarves 2-20 in number, erect-ascending, 40-114 mm long, umbel 6-32-flowered. Eracts (4.5-) 6.7-9 (-16) mm long. lanceolate and entire or obovate-cuneate and 3-5-toothed at the apex. Pedicel (5-) 11.6-15.3 (-40) mm long, up to 60 mm in fruit. Flowers white, fading to pink or pink-red. Calyx 4.8-5.8 (-6.5) mm long, campanulate, pubescent-glandular, accrescent and sometimes up to 10 mm in fruit; lobes 5 mm long, ovate to elliptic-ovate, apex toothed or not so. Corolla limb 7.6-10.5 mm broad, lobes 3-4 mm long, retuse; throat exannulate. Style less than 1 mm long, stigma capitate. Capsule 3 mm broad, globose, included in the calyx. Seeds (8-) 12-27 in number, more or less 1-2 mm long, ovoid-globose, black to brown.
The species Androsace rotundifolia was described by Hardwicke from the ‘highest mountains of Sreenagur’, namely from the Kumaon Himalaya. J.D. Hooker (1882), realising the variability potrayed by the species over its wide geographical range, recognised 5 varieties. Later Knuth (1905) increased the number of varieties to 9. Of these, 3 varieties namely var. rotundifolia (=var. incise (Wall) Kn. and var. elegans (Duby) Kn., var. glandulosa and var. thomsonii are known to occur in Pakistan and Kashmir.
In the present work the var. rotundifolia and var. glandulosa, which to some extent are morphologically dissimilar and occupy more or less separate geographical areas, are considered as of subspecific status. The var. thomsonii, which differs in the morphology from the other two varieties is raised to specific rank.
